July 2005

Weekend Status: A-OK.

July 30, 2005: Yeah, so far, it's been pretty okay. Not bad, not stellar, but just right and good. Last night, I went to Sams Town in order to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (a VERY ENJOYABLE film from Tim Burton, of course. Really, the only time Tim Burton dropped the ball, in my humble opinion, was Mars Attacks!, which in hindsight has value for just being so weird. But when you waited in line and paid good money for opening night, AND you have friends glaring at you for making them sit through that, well, you gotta say it wasn't the best movie). After the movie, much like I did when I saw the Island last week, I dropped by the craps table. But as opposed to that horrible experience (annoying and unenthusiastic people at the table combined with rapid loss of money), this one was fun, with enjoyable players, a good crew, and the ability to play for a few hours and make $30. Hey, it's better than losing. I got to bed finally at 3 this morning, then woke up to meet the Schofields and the Foxs at the Kona Grill in Summerlin (remember you have to say Summerlin very snobbily). That was fun, and then afterwards we had some Coldstone Creamery ice cream (YUM), drove around looking at expensive houses on the West side of Vegas, and finally made it to Suncoast to watch Wedding Crashers, a very funny movie. Apparently it's more funny to guys than girls as Amber and Cheryl didn't like it that much, but Schofield and I were laughing our asses off. And now I'm back here, debating on whether to go out after working on my new Quest for Dice page. I think I've decided against it. I'm getting sleepy and I'd rather not lose money or spend it needlessly. So now it's time to just relax and enjoy a few Alaskan beers. Yes, Saturday night will end well.
What's New? My new dice page is up. Also, if you're so inclined to visit the Shooting Gallery, please do. And if you're a spammer, I'm sure I'll be deleting your spam off my guestbook soon enough as well.

Have you decorated lately?

July 27, 2005: So, we were at Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch today (I'm slowly realizing how nice it is to have lunch there - lunch is easily 2 hours if you go there!) and realized how much fun using the word decorate is as a euphemism for relations which is itself a euphemism for sex. So, have you decorated with a group of people lately? In the kitchen? Heh heh heh!

So, tomorrow is when we have to go in the middle of this blech heat and get rid of lots of excess computer equipment from our offices. For those in the military, it's DRMO-time. And that sucks. But once it's over, it's cool. But that whole until-it's-over part really sucks.

Based on what C-Money has mentioned in my guestbook, I started up a thread in my dusty, forgotten Shooting Gallery all about discussing Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. It's filled to the brim with spoilers, and no spoiler tags, so if you haven't read it yet, or are going to wait for the movie and don't want to be spoiled, avoid it all costs.

Well, I'm going to shower, and then get back to designing stuff for the Hob-E-Mart. CivvyJenn proposed an idea which had me laughing hysterically, even breaking into laughter while exercising, but which I will sadly not do, as it is kinda mean. It's so damn funny though. But if she were to put it on her site, well, I wouldn't know any better.
What's New? I wish I could say I had won at craps, at the lottery, or that my car didn't have a new fucking ding in it, but then I'd be lying. So for now, it's just check out the Hob-E-Mart and the Shooting Gallery.

Get your official website crap! Now!

July 26, 2005: I blatantly copied what CivilianJenny did on her website - so now I too have a gift shop that you can peruse. Not too much stuff there now, but the stuff that is there has all-original designs! Get while the getting's good. Anyways, as a side note, I'm not making any profit off of this stuff - maybe once I get more stuff created or actually pay for the website, I might. But for now, if you want to have some fun hobie stuff, you now can! Here's the link to my store's site, as well as CivJenny's!

BB6 Note: I can't believe how much I'm loving this show. I really wasn't interested in the other seasons - but after watching all the episodes so far (thank God for DVR), I am hooked. Right now, the current Head of Household Kaysar nominated two people that were a big surprise to the entire house. And now, while before the house was split up into a huge majority vs the small minority (which Kaysar was a part of), his choices have set the whole house off. It's awesome. Everyone is scrambling, no one trusts each other, and it's brilliant. Kaysar couldn't have picked a better two people to put up on the block. What will be even better is if the power of veto is used tonight. SWEET!!!

What Goes Down in the Ghetto, Stays in the Ghetto (sts)

July 25, 2005: Words of wisdom, folks, words of wisdom. Thanks to Pony for that one. Anyways, this weekend was a blur. I slept in a lot, I ended up talking to lots of my friends this weekend, which was very cool, I finally made it back to Best Buy (yay!!!) and Barnes & Noble, where I have ignited a new desire to learn the ins and outs of Macromedia Flash. So expect a version 3 of the website sometime soon - definitely before I leave for Colorado. I also saw the Island on Saturday night - not a bad movie, not the best, but definitely entertaining. I am actually shocked it only made just over $10M this weekend - I have a feeling people just didn't understand what the hell the movie was about and decided to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory again. Not that I blame those people - I think the Island ended up being a horrible title, especially having seen the movie.

So, some other news: I found out I will be the SCB Flight Commander when I PCS to Colorado Springs. Yep, not the deputy!! So I'm excited, and scared. I'll actually be a flight commander! Boy those people are screwed. :-) Anyways, I have even been talking to my sponsor, and I've now received about 3 different realtors to talk to as well. I'm starting to understand the home buying business a tad more, but it's time to read those books Uncle Richard brought me, as what I want to do is go househunting in Colorado in October, which will hopefully give me enough time to close the sale and be able to walk right in to my new home. I CAN'T WAIT!!!!! (for buying a house, leaving this wretched city, having a new beginning....yep, it'll be nice).

I also talked to my Dad - I think I'll be trying to go visit there earlier this year than normal, as December just kinda sucks. So perhaps September I'll be making a trip to the Caribbean - right in the thick of hurricane season!!! whoooweee!!

Well, enough of my blahblahblah. My ego has calmed down a little, so no riff on how wonderful I am. At least for today. Stay tuned. To keep you entertained, here are some pictures I've been taking this month. Some from the 4th of July, some from the Quest for Dice Pt 1, and some from and of my apartment before the massive painting project going on here. See ya later.

Fourth of July pics - 3 July 2005
Cheryl can't wait for fireworks!	Pic 1 of our coolest home firework	Pic 2 of the same one - this one kept on going!	A final pic of that SAME firework. Kick ass.

Quest for Dice, Part 1 - July 9, 2005
Me and the MGM Lion	Me and NY NY	Me and the Excalibur	The MGM Lion	The Luxor Sphinx	Me too	Inside the Luxor pyramid
Excalibur	View of NYNY from Excalibur	The NYNY entrance	The NYNY Brooklyn Bridge	Fox and the strip	Redux	The NYNY Strip side
Me and the bridge	The Monte Carlo entrance	View of Bellagio from the Aladdin	The elaborate stain glass ceiling between Paris and Bally's	The Bally's tunnel of doom	Bally's Entrance	Copied Robbie's shot of the Bellagio registration desk area

Apartment & Lightning - July 21, 2005
My apartment, before the new paint job	Crazy lightning storm action	More

What's New? Ah, not much. But there's pictures up there. And soon, yes, soon, I promise an updated hobiebarnes.com. With Flash and stuff. Version 3, baby! In the meantime, my self-titled page is updated with all sorts of wonders and goodies. Or at the very least, there's new info and pictures there. And lots of my patented super-duper charisma and charm. How can you stand the wait? Click away and find the joy for yourself.

Is This 4 Updates in a Row?

July 20, 2005: Jesus Christ, someone call someone! Anyways, can you believe how cool that picture is that Jason made? He sent them over email today and all I gotta say is, WOW. I have so much to learn about Photoshop, as that just turned out awesome. Below are some more pictures, including another unique collage he made of me and the Space Needle. Plus, some pics that Michancy sent me when we met up at Sams Town the other day. I miss my friends!!!!

Jason's awesome collage of Alaska pics	I'm winning the ring toss	Michancy is yelling at me!!!	OK, here we're a tad more normal

Oh, and I'm very soon going to steal CivilianJenny's idea that she has discreetly introduced on her website: Selling T-shirts and various other things/crap!!! How cool is that?! I just need to develop the logo I want, and soon, you, YES, YOU!, will be able to buy an official hobiebarnes.com T-shirt!!!! How freakin' sweet is that?

And in another crazy note, I am one funny bastard. I was looking around my site just now and had to laugh at the moodring (thanks again, Byron, for that breakdown) and then the whole section on making a PC with me. How freakin' funny are those pictures of me? Yes, mememememememememememememememememememe. Ah, that feels better.

Is Anybody Else Out There Watching Big Brother 6?

July 19, 2005: Holy crap! I don't know if all seasons have had this much drama so fast and so soon in the season (it's only the second week for chrissakes), but dayum, there were literally 4 people at each other's throats just during today's episode. They couldn't actually touch each other, as 'Big Brother' separated them, but oh my God, it was hilarious. These people are already snapping at each other - they've been like together for a week. And I thought I was bad at dealing with people. But seriously, Michael is so gone. He's acting so damn crazy and in-your-face, it's crazy. CRazy. For some reason, I like Janelle. She's such a bitch, but who cares. The others really are Midget's sheep.

What a Day

July 18, 2005: Quoted word for word from something I got in the mail (all misspellings are letter for letter how the flyer was printed and anything in light blue is my commentary):

Why keep paying for
something that it's not going
to be yours?

Have you ever though in all the money
you have lost paying on your apartment rent? (...WhatWhatWhat?)
Today could be your best time to get it !!!!

"The house of your dream"

Remember Las Vegas is growing up more & more
and the properties value too!

Decide to get your home now!

We'd help you to get the best financing interest. (...but we have better things to do)
On RMS we give you the financial services you deserve.
We have loan programs with up to 0% down & we'll
prequalify you within minutes!!!

If you have any cuestions, please call ....

WOW! Methinks not. First, I don't remember the house from my one dream. And that initial tagline makes me think that all this money is going to end up buying nothing - I mean, is that legalese or something? And frankly, if I have cuestions, I am thinking I should see a doctor. So I believe I'll be sticking with USAA for my financial advice for the time being. But I'll keep the flyer handy.

So what a day this has been. The Clearcube stress monkey (thanks to Squirrel for that term) has been shot in the head. Oh it feels nice. Turns out one of the programs that allow concurrent connections (called WinConnect Server XP for those geeks out there really curious) was installed at a version level totally not compatible with SP2. I got the latest version from the Clearcube guys, and sure enough, it worked. Thank the Lord. So that started off this early day right (I've been coming in at 0630 some mornings just anticipating having to uninstall SP2 from all the blades). Then it was just a weird day with friends calling, me actually gaining complete and total disgust for a coworker that I had previously got along well with (it's not any of the readers of this site, nor is it the easy choice of my boss, who I got along with okay today), seeming like I was on speed at dinner tonight as I regaled my dice stories from the weekend (I about wrote "craps stories" above instead of dice stories, but then I realized that sounded really gross...), then playing craps and initally winning but then eventually losing. After all that, I'm actually quite beat.

So hopefully everybody else's Monday was nice too. Connie, I hope you're doing okay! That nose injury does not sound like it felt good at all.

Well, I actually think I'm going to get ready to turn in for the evening - 2130 isn't a bad time to go to bed and I'm needing the sleep. Getting to work at 0630 actually is nice, as it's the 'cool' part of the day still, and by cool, I mean low 90s. IT'S SO FUCKING HOT HERE IN VEGAS I WANT TO WRITE IN ALL CAPS BECAUSE OF IT. There, I've said it. Do you know that it's nighttime right now and it's STILL 114 degrees? I hate this weather. Every day this week has been way over 110 degrees, and they (you know, them) say we're up for breaking the record of most consecutive days over 110 degrees. I miss last summer, as it only got really hot for a little bit and then it cooled off. Not so this time. It's Vegas' little way of saying goodbye to me. Aww, how sweet. Fucking city.

Do you know that I helped move someone this weekend? It was godawful hot then too. I hate heat.

At this very moment...

July 17, 2005: ..there are probably millions upon millions of kids and adults reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Amazing that in this electronic age, it's possible to get people to crack open a book. There was a rant by some columnist against Harry Potter and it's lack of literary value and it's detrimental effect on society. Is he fucking nuts? I wouldn't say that the Harry Potter series is going to cure cancer, but I don't think reading Ulysses (the book that he mentions is worthy of reading) is exactly going to get people to go back to the bookstore. In fact, it may cure people of ever wanting to read again. I think I got exactly one chapter into Ulysses before realizing I had no need to finish this just yet in that point of my life. It is just awesome that an author can get people to enjoy reading, and that is an accomplishment in itself. The fact that her stories are so involving is just awesome storytelling. But back to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Absolutely amazing. I won't go into spoilers here as others probably don't read as fast as me and others definitely have more going on in their lives than I do, so I could afford to lock myself up in my apartment and finish it. But actually, I did help people move yesterday, and I went and gambled this morning after satisfying a craving for scrambled eggs and pancakes at the Boulder Station Cafe. So I wasn't totally locked up in my house. It was quite a story though, and had much more payoff than Order of the Phoenix did, although the setup for the seventh and final book is definitely there. JK Rowling must write that book immediately - yet I guess we won't be seeing anytime before 2007 at the earliest. Oh well, I can wait. No need to rush the ending. It will be a doozie, I wager.

So sorry for not updating the site that much this past week. This was another of those weeks where I was definitely NOT in my happy place. In fact, on Wednesday, I actually starting to do research on just how easy/hard it would be to get out of the military by taking part in the Force Shaping plan. Yes, I was that done with the military. I've since calmed a little bit, and realize I'm just not quite ready to sever ties that quickly - I will finish out my last two years, get out in 2007, and go from there. I'm actually looking forward to moving to Colorado. But I'm so getting out in 2007, it's not even funny. I just figure this gives me a deadline and some time to float a resume out there, network, and line up a sweet job. Hopefully. Further, I hope that this will give me time to save up money for any future businesses that need starting, including the idea that Schofield and Fox and I have had. But we'll need to discuss that at a later date.

Oh, Schofield and I are thinking about applying for the Amazing Race 9. Yes, AR8 hasn't even aired yet, but 8 is the one with the teams of 4 people each. I think we'd kill each other if we actually got picked, but it would be some awesome TV.

And with that, I'm going to get ready to go to Outback. I've been DDR (Dance Dance Revolution)'ing a lot lately, and I'm quite good at the Standard level. And playing at Standard level is one helluva workout. One day, I will actually have an in-shape physique. Maybe. IF those damn cheese fries would stop tempting me!

Trying to retain sanity

July 10, 2005: It was NOT a good week. July 4th weekend was fun - I spent the 3rd with the Schofields, and we drank, played with fireworks, and had good ol' fashioned karaoke fun. Schmofield got drunk. It was awesome. The next day I ended up getting a delayed hangover - a sign of what was to come I guess. I wish it was just future hangovers - but instead it was just a crap week. Things broke, my boss(es) were gone, it was busy, and I just hated everything. It was a long week, and I even lost my appetite, and couldn't sleep. I hate when things get like that. But anyways, by the end of the week, I was so ready for the end of the week. Ended up starting the goal of getting used craps dice from every casino - but unfortunately found out that a lot of casinos don't sell them. In fact, a LOT of casinos don't sell them. So ended up going all the way from Mandalay Bay up to O'Sheas, hitting every casino on the way. Gonna have to hit a lot again to see if they may have some more. Anyways, also saw Michancy and her husband just this evening. I was supposed to go hang with them at the Hofbrauhaus on Friday, but instead I slept for 13 hours. I hate my job. But I did manage to hang out with them this afternoon at the bar in the middle of Sam's Town in the big open area. They even had Alaskan Amber on special. AND I was wearing my Alaskan Beer T-shirt. Uncanny, eh? It was great to hang out and BS with Michancy. I just wish we could have hung out more, but whatever. And now I'm back, and I finished up my damn Alaska pictures. Finally.
What's New? All my Alaska pictures are finally up. Here's a link to the main Alaska picture page. Explore and enjoy.

Me Likey the 4-day weekend

July 3, 2005: Although it's very hard to determine exactly what it is I did that makes me likey it so much. I haven't done too much that is noteworthy except lose and spend some money, play some video games, watch some movies (saw Being John Malkovich finally last night - very strange movie. Hilarious at times, but at the end, I was left with these thoughts: 1) What the hell happened at the end? 2) I didn't like any of these characters - especially John Cusack's character, who was so freakin creepy & 3) John Malkovich is extremely funny to have been in this, especially the scene with all the Malkoviches. Malkovich! Malkovich!), and try to sleep, although in this kinda weather, even with the A/C on, I have difficulty doing so.

I'm off to the Schofields' house this afternoon for a 4th of July barbecue. Since the 4th is on a Monday before work, it made sense to do this today so we still had tomorrow to lounge about and recover from any hangovers (hopefully not). And talking about next week, all I gotta say is that it is going to suck donkey balls. First, Schofield is on leave all next week. Then, so is pretty much EVERYONE else in our detachment. The boss and the deputy are going TDY, so I'm 'in charge'. Bwahahahahaahaahaahahahahaa! What was he thinking? Anyways, it'll just suck. Yay for next week!
What's New? I made my next page in the Alaska epic - as you can tell, this is going to take a while at this rate. Maybe tomorrow I'll churn out a lot more just to get this monkey off my back.

Shoot me an email if you want to. I may respond. (okay, you know I will - what else have I got to do?)